Don’t Win The Warm-Up!

News flash! No points are awarded for incredible shots made during the warm-up before the match starts!

The warm-up is just that – a warm-up. It gives you an opportunity to loosen up, to hit a few ground strokes, hit a few volleys, maybe a couple of overheads, hopefully several serves. And while you are going through your warm-up shots, your opponent is also going through theirs. So you owe it to her (or him) to provide some nice feeds that can be hit back to you.

In other words, the warm-up is not the time to hit incredible angle volleys. It is not the time to hit an overhead right back at me. It is not the time to respond to my ground strokes with a never-ending stream of lobs.

Perhaps, you're thinking, this is all so obvious. Does anyone really need to be reminded that the warm-up is just the warm-up? Well, my recent experience is that there are several women out there who either don't know or don't care about properly warming-up. Maybe they just want to get their shots in and are oblivious to whether I ever get a chance to hit anything decent. Maybe it is some great psychological ploy on their part – asserting their authority before the match even starts. Maybe they just don't like to warm-up and don't care what happens with me.

But I think going through the warm-up appropriately is a required act of tennis etiquette. And failing to warm-up appropriately is just rude.

Either you know what I'm saying or you don't. Hopefully you do and you'll never aim your warm-up overhead right at me.